


Manhattan Project

by IreneADonovan



Series: Rush and Beer [5]
Category: Daredevil (Comics), X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Road Trips, dadneto, father-son bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 02:31:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10401756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IreneADonovan/pseuds/IreneADonovan
Summary: Erik and Peter make their first stop of the road trip in Hell's Kitchen...





	

**Author's Note:**

> I absolutely couldn't resist this crossover. I was a Daredevil fan years before I delved into the X-Men. (I got hooked on Frank Miller's run on Daredevil.) So once I figured out a rationale for this, I just had to do it...
> 
> It's not necessary to have read the other stories in the series, but there are a couple of references that may not make sense without having done so.

“So where are we going first?” Peter glanced at the stack of maps on the kitchen table.  


“Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, after we make a stop in Manhattan. Can you be ready to go in the morning.?” Erik ran through his mental checklist of things he still needed to do, like pack his socks and kiss Charles until his lips turned blue from lack of oxygen.  


All of a sudden Peter's hair looked more flyaway and he was holding a can of soda he hadn't had a moment ago. Peter chugged some soda, burped, said, “I can be ready in two minutes if you want me to.”  


“Tomorrow morning will be fine,” Erik answered dryly.  


**~xXx~**  


Erik woke at dawn, as he always did. Charles' head was pillowed on his chest, his love looking utterly relaxed and utterly content. He pressed his fingers to Charles' lips, was rewarded with a happy smile.  


With a twinge of regret Erik eased Charles off his body. Charles mumbled a protest but didn't fully wake. “I'll be back, _Schatz_.”  


He pulled on sweats and slipped outside for his morning run.  


Peter was awake and sitting at the kitchen table when he returned. His son was dressed in his usual uniform of concert shirt (Styx today) and jeans, his shaggy silver hair wet from the shower. He'd made coffee and was halfway through a cup. A plate, empty save for a few crumbs, sat before him, and the newspaper, rumpled from being speed-read, sat to the side of the plate.  


Erik pulled a plate from the cupboard, took a raspberry danish from the tray of pastries, sat across from his son. “I need to shower and say goodbye to Charles, but I'd like to leave in an hour.”  


Peter didn't appear to move, but Erik felt a gust of air, and suddenly Peter's plate held two more pastries. “Cool. I'll be ready.”  


After Erik ate, he poured himself more coffee and returned to Charles' suite – he still couldn't quite think of it as _theirs_.  


Charles was awake now and leaning against the headboard, his blue eyes bright and alert. “How soon are you leaving?” he asked.  


“I told Peter an hour.” Erik crossed to Charles' side, kissed him slow and deep, like a thirsty man kneeling at an oasis. “I'll miss you,” he said when he finally came up for air.  


“And I, you. Stay safe.”  


Erik kissed him again. “I could make it two hours.”  


“As tempting as that is, I have a class to teach in an hour and a half. And an example to set.”  


Erik nodded, stole one more kiss, then headed for the shower.  


**~xXx~**  


Peter was about to vibrate out of his shoes by the time his dad arrived in the garage. “You're three minutes late,” he protested.  


“Don't you mean three hours?”  


His dad was joking with him? Holy shit. The professor really was good for him.  


His dad carried only a small duffel and gazed with dismay at the stuff arrayed at Peter's feet – duffel, backpack, boombox, and a box of books – Shakespeare, Tolkien, Tolstoy, Voltaire. He really was almost finished with the professor's library.  


“Do you really need all that? We'll only be gone four days.”  


“I get bored easy.”  


His dad rolled his eyes but popped the trunk. He removed a file from his bag, hefted the bag in, then grabbed Peter's duffel and backpack.  


Peter scooped up the box and his boombox, put them in with the rest of the luggage. His dad handed him the file folder, saying, “Charles' notes. Read them.”  


And then they were off, at a geriatric snail's pace – in other words, the speed limit. But it probably wasn't good for a terrorist, even a retired one, to call attention to himself by speeding.  


Peter opened the file There was a single sheet from a legal pad, covered with the professor's neat script, and a snapshot of a youth with fiery red hair and cloudy grey eyes. The kid was blind?  


Peter skimmed the professor's notes. Matt Murdock, age thirteen. Straight-A student. Career ambition: lawyer. Blinded by exposure to bio-hazardous material (likely radioactive) at age ten. Induced mutation, also a result of said exposure. Remaining senses enhanced. Father, prizefighter, deceased as of ten months ago. Mother's whereabouts unknown, presumed also deceased.  


The rest of the file was contact names and addresses. Foster mother. Current school. Social workers.  


Looked like the kid could use a good break for a change.  


They reached Hell's Kitchen a little after noon. The neighborhood definitely deserved its hardscrabble reputation. The buildings were old and tired and grungy; the sidewalks, cracked and broken; the streets in need of paving. But Peter sensed a certain defiant pride radiating from the people on the streets. _Yeah, life sucks, but we're still here._  


Matt's foster mom, Ina Martin lived in a third-floor walk-up over a deli, which was good, because Peter was _starving_. His dad was a little annoyed, but Peter couldn't help that his metabolism was as fast as the rest of him. So Peter devoured a couple of sandwiches and some chips, washed it all down with a Coke, and only then did they go upstairs to meet Mrs. Martin.  


A small woman with frizzly blonde hair answered the door.  


“Mrs. Martin? We're from the Xavier School,” his dad said.  


Mrs. Martin eyed Peter skeptically. He met her gaze. So what if he didn't look like a teacher, even if the professor was trying to get him to take over a literature course next semester.  


“My name is Erik Eisenhardt,” his dad said, “and this is Peter Maximoff. We're here to offer Matt a scholarship to our school.”  


She stared at them a moment longer before stepping back. “Come in. Matt should be back from school soon.”  


They sat in the cramped living room and his dad described the school, careful to avoid any mention of the real meaning of the word “gifted” in the school's name, something he knew his dad chafed at, though he seemed far less militant since he'd finally started nailing the professor. Mutant-phobia had spiked after the whole Apocalypse thing, and his dad would never put the professor at risk again.  


His dad was in the middle of explaining the staff's credentials, waxing just a little too rhapsodic over the headmaster's doctorate from Oxford – his dad really did have it bad for the professor – when the apartment door banged open to reveal a furious-looking Matt, cane in hand, backpack slung over one shoulder. “You're sending me away, too?” He spun and ran down the hall.  


His dad shot him a glance, but Peter was already o his feet and on his way out the door. It was highly frustrating to have to keep to human speed until he was out of Mrs. Martin's sight, but as soon as he closed the apartment door, he was off after the kid.  


He caught up to Matt on the stairs, blocked his path at the first landing. “Hold on, Matt,” he said.  


Matt tried to push past. “Let me go.”  


“Just listen to me a minute,” Peter said. “No one's going to make you go anywhere if you don't want to.”  


The kid's expression said, _Yeah, right_.  


“Really. We came here to offer you a scholarship, if you want it.”  


Matt was still suspicious. “You don't sound like a teacher.”  


“I'm not, not yet, but I've been asked to teach literature in the fall.”  


“What kind of school is this, anyway? Not a school for the blind – I'm doing just fine where I am.”  


“A school for people with unique abilities, like your enhanced senses.”  


“How do you know about that?” Matt sounded freaked.  


“Professor Xavier, one of his gifts is to be able to find people like us.”  


“Us?”  


“Yeah. Us.”  


Now the kid just looked intrigued. “What can you do?”  


“Run really fast.” He grinned, forgetting for a moment the kid couldn't see it. “Want a demonstration? Give me your hand.”  


Peter wrapped his right hand around Matt's, braced the boy's head with the left, and took off down the stairs, out the door, and halfway down the block. He zipped up the trunk of a tree and stopped with them sitting on a stout branch.  


Surprisingly, Matt didn't even look sick. His hand felt the tree branch, and he broke into a grin. “That was awesome!”  


They sat there for a few minutes and chatted about the school. “So who's the guy with the stick up his butt? Let me guess – gym teacher.”  


Peter laughed. “He does teach self-defense, but he also teaches German and French and Spanish.”  


“How'd you get stuck making this trip with him?”  


“He's my dad.”  


Matt got quiet, and Peter remembered, too late, that he'd lost his own father recently. But after a moment Matt just nodded and said, “Cool.”  


“We should probably get back. They're gonna start wondering where we are.”  


Matt sighed. “Okay.” Then he grinned. “Can we do the speed thing again?”  


“Sure.”  


Once they'd walked back into the apartment, Matt announced that he wanted to accept the scholarship. His dad had quirked an eyebrow in surprise, but then he beamed at Peter with what could only be fatherly pride.  


Cool. Way cool.


End file.
